Snow removal can get deadly serious

One of my “direct reports,” as we call our employees in corporatespeak, reported he'd be a little late for work the morning after the third-biggest accumulation of snow since we started tracking such things.

Seems he'd spent three hours shoveling out the end of his driveway, only to discover — stop me if you've heard this one before — the municipal plows had come by and re-plowed snow into the end of the driveway. Rather than shovel again, he attempted to plow his car through the snow, got stuck with his car half in the driveway, half blocking the street.

He called his local public works department to complain/seek a re-plow. (“Got a receptionist,” he grumbled.) She offered little help other than to suggest he “have a nice day.”

His next thought, which he later realized the futility of, was to ring up the public works director and point out, “Listen, I'm 60 years old, with two cardiac stents. If I have a heart attack shoveling snow, it's gonna be on your head.”

Stop. I can almost hear the public works guy say, I've heard that one before.

Impractical to dispatch a truck unclog a single driveway? Sure. Still, it's a frustration we all identify with. How we fared in fighting The Blizzard of ‘11 depends on your personal perspective.

If your driveway was repeatedly blocked by newly plowed snow, or if you were among the scores of motorists stranded for hours on Lake Shore Drive — or Gary Avenue in Carol Stream — not so good. If you're me, you're waiting to be struck by lightning, so good was your luck the morning of The Blizzard. Not only did the guy arrive reasonably early to plow the driveways in our townhouse complex, he also did our side street, which seems to be last on the city's priority list. The main arteries were clear, and the Ronald Reagan Republican Memorial Tollway was a joy to behold — four unobstructed eastbound lanes and not a car in sight.

I believe in snow karma, too.

We knew, for weeks, it seems, that The Blizzard was coming. Lots of time to write those get-ready-for-Stormageddon stories. So I assigned Elisabeth Mistretta to do a piece detailing how much better-equipped we are to deal with today's blizzards compared to those of 1967 and 1979. (As evidence, at least in my own little world, I asked several people, “Do you even remember the Great Snow of 1999?” No one did, even though that 21.6-inch snowfall easily topped the 18.8 inches that came down in ‘79.)

Beth's story — chronicling the advances in weather forecasting, snow plowing equipment and training — ran on the front page of Wednesday's paper. Due to The Blizzard, that paper was not delivered until the following day, along with Thursday's paper — a special bonus treat for our subscribers who were still enjoying a snow day.

But Beth still was snowbound Thursday, stuck with more than 100 other inhabitants of her townhouse complex, waiting for their parking lot to be plowed.

Thanks to advances in technology, equipment and training, it wasn't a snow day for Beth. She reports on — and takes the photos for — the stranded complex story in Friday's paper. And in perhaps the most amazing coincidence of all time, the plows arrived minutes after Beth called the village for comment about the delay.

That's the tricky part about covering the weather — a story that changes before your very eyes. But that's why we have a website, which we try to update diligently as news occurs. For instance, we did not know until we called the coroner's office Thursday morning — and posted the information immediately — that three people died Wednesday in DuPage County. We heard of a fourth later in the day.

All were men in their 60s.

Shoveling snow.

Stop me if you've heard that one before.

jdavis@dailyherald.com